


the road not taken

by CeruleanTactician



Series: the stars were made for falling [2]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Canon Divergence - Battle of Mustafar, Canon Divergence - Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith, Canon-Typical Violence, Dark, Fix-It of Sorts, Gen, POV Female Character, POV Padmé Amidala, Padmé Amidala Lives, Tragedy, Wordcount: 5.000-10.000
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-30
Updated: 2020-12-30
Packaged: 2021-03-11 02:01:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,767
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28417287
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CeruleanTactician/pseuds/CeruleanTactician
Summary: “Padmé,” Obi-Wan says, his voice somehow still gentle. “He killed Ahsoka.”After the fall of the Republic, Padmé must deal with the galaxy as it is, not as she wishes it to be.
Relationships: Padmé Amidala & Ahsoka Tano, Padmé Amidala & Obi-Wan Kenobi, Padmé Amidala/Anakin Skywalker
Series: the stars were made for falling [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1949089
Comments: 22
Kudos: 128





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Sequel to [_the clock runs out_](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26588515).

_19 BBY_

After Padmé gets back from their new Emperor’s first speech in the Senate, she sends all of her handmaidens away. They take the news about as well as she expected. Moteé wrings her hands and paces. Hollé is as pale as the moons of Naboo; she has been ever since the Jedi Temple started burning. Ellé nods in head in silent assent, but her eyes are worried and watchful. 

Dormé resists the most.

“My lady,” she says. “You need our help now more than ever.”

“It’s not safe on Coruscant anymore. You all need to get home. Stay with family, for a while.” Padmé says. Not that she thinks that Naboo will be safe. Their newly crowned Emperor will make sure of that, a fact that stings as much as it humiliates her. How well she had once thought she knew Palpatine. But she knows her handmaidens are smart enough to read between the lines.

Dormé takes her arm, gentle but firm. “What about you?”

“Captain Typho will be here. Threepio will be here. I’ll be fine.” She forces herself to smile. “I’m needed here, right now.”

Dormé and the others leave only with clear reluctance and a promise from Padmé to comm them if anything happens. 

Starting with the day she was first elected Queen, Padmé’s handmaidens had become her sisters, her other halves. The only reason why she functioned as well as she did in spite of all of her responsibilities. Even as she had kept secrets from them, she had regretted it bitterly. She hoped that this would not be the last time she saw them.

Padmé hears from Bail over the next hours via an encrypted comm that she once thought was overly paranoid: over one hundred members of the Delegation of 2000 have been arrested, so far. She looks out her window. The Jedi Temple is still burning, as it had been the entire night.

_Anakin will be back. I told him I would wait. He’ll be back._

But she has not heard from Anakin since he left for Mustafar. She turns her comm over in one hand and she thinks of her child. No one has responded- not Anakin, not Ahsoka, not Obi-Wan, or any of the other Jedi she knows. Padmé watches the smoke and ash from the Temple turn the skies of Coruscant a deep orange, and she weeps.

* * *

When Obi-Wan sneaks into her apartment a few hours later, his expression serious, his robes dirty and slightly singed, she takes his arm, so relieved she can hardly speak.

She had considered Obi-Wan a friend since he and his Master had saved her planet and her people all those years ago. But over three years of war, she and Obi-Wan had become close friends. In the last weeks of the war, they had talked almost daily: about Padmé’s efforts to try and resume peace negotiations with the Separatists, about the Cloned Sentients' Rights bill that despite all her efforts she never even managed to get out of committee. 

But, admittedly, most of the conversations had revolved around the person they both loved most in the galaxy: Anakin. During last few days, as Obi-Wan worried for his former padawan and Padmé worried for her husband, he had come by her apartment every day. Obi-Wan visits had eased her mind, somewhat- she knew, at least, that someone else was looking out for Anakin too.

“Obi-Wan! You’re alright, thank the Gods.” Padmé pulls the Jedi Master into a hug, which he returns carefully. 

She isn’t hiding her pregnancy anymore. There’s hardly a point, now. Everything she has spent the past seven months worrying about is engulfed by the magnitude of what has happened.

“What’s happened? Palpatine has said that the Jedi tried to assassinate him. He’s declared himself Emperor, in front of the Senate.”

“I know,” he says.

Padmé shakes her head. “What- what’s _happened_ , Obi-Wan? Have you heard anything from Anakin?”

She notices for the first time: Obi-Wan’s face is grim and pale. His robes are unclean.

He does not have good news for her.

He tells her this: Anakin has turned to the Dark Side. Anakin has joined Palpatine, who is actually a Sith Lord named Darth Sidious. Who has been controlling the war from two fronts. Anakin has betrayed the Jedi in the worst way possible. Anakin has killed Jedi younglings, children he knew.

But the last thing Obi-Wan tells her is-

“Padmé,” Obi-Wan says, his voice somehow still gentle. “He killed Ahsoka.”

And Padmé’s heart stops for the third time that day. First, when she saw the Temple burning. Second, when she watched the democracy in the galaxy end with applause. Third- 

“No. You’re wrong. Ahsoka is- she’s still away. She’s stationed on Saleucami. I talked to her a few days ago, and she doesn’t get leave for another month.” says Padmé, with real conviction in her voice. 

She doesn’t add that Palpatine has said all Jedi traitors were to be hunted down- Obi-Wan already knew that. And Ahsoka was smart, she could avoid capture. Padmé knew she could.

The look on Obi-Wan’s face will haunt her for the rest of her life. It is a look of hopelessness. It is a look of _pity_.

“She must have sensed something wrong through the Force and decided she had to return,” he says, voice still so impossibly gentle. “Padmé. I saw the security hologram. I saw her struck down myself. Her and countless other Jedi, the young and the old alike.”

She stands up, backs away quickly as if she had been physically burned.

“Why would you say that?” Padmé shakes her head. “I can’t believe you. Anakin wouldn’t do this. He would never hurt Ahsoka. Never.”

“I would have said the same thing a day ago. But now I have seen proof to the contrary.”

Obi-Wan looks towards the window, towards the smoke still rising. _“_ We were all deceived. It seems that we must pay a high toll for our deception.”

He stands up. “The man we knew, that we- cared for- is dead. You will not be safe with him. Please, Padmé, for your child’s sake, if not your own, leave. Hide. I know you have friends across the galaxy. Tell me where he went, and I will end this quickly.”

“You’re going to- you can’t ask me to do that.” Padmé says, actually shocked. “He’s my husband!” 

For a moment, it is Obi-Wan’s turn to be shocked. Genuine surprise- hurt, perhaps- flashes across his face. But it is gone in an instant, and he is the impassive Jedi Master once more.

“If you are not willing to help, then I must go.” Obi-Wan looks at her one last time- devastated, pregnant and alone. 

“I’m so sorry.”

She watches him go in silence, and she thinks once more of the galaxy she decided to bring her child into. She tries to comm Ahsoka for an hour before she gives up.

* * *

_21 BBY_

When Padmé Amidala first met Ahsoka Tano, the bright, confident young girl had followed her new husband around more like an overexcited sprite rather than a solemn Jedi padawan. She was dressed more like a trendy Coruscanti teenling than any Jedi padawan she had seen before. 

Padmé gives Anakin a curious look, her eyebrows slightly raised. He hadn’t told her anything about considering taking a padawan the last time they talked. In fact, the last time they had talked, Anakin had been complaining that _Obi-Wan_ was talking about taking a new padawan. Anakin gives her a slightly strained smile in return.

“Senator Amidala,” says Anakin, in that formal but friendly way he always said her name when they weren’t alone. “It’s always a pleasure to see you. Thank you for your help with the negotiations.”

“Of course, Master Skywalker. I was simply doing my duty,” says Padmé. “And this must be Ahsoka.”

“It’s an honor to meet you, Senator,” says Ahsoka, words carefully practiced, looking a little restless.

Padmé gives her a smile. “I heard you did a wonderful job. The Republic thanks you, Knight Skywalker and Padawan Tano.”

Ahsoka smiles back, a little shyly, her sharp Togruta teeth visible.

“Forgive me Senator, but we must be going. We have to debrief with the Jedi Council.” Anakin says. And she can tell by the look on his face that he is truly sorry.

“Of course, I wouldn’t want to keep you from your duties. Farewell, Master Jedi, Padawan Tano.” Padmé says.

The debriefs keep him for the next few hours. Padmé reads legislative briefs and proposed bills as she works on dinner, hoping that it wouldn’t be cold by the time Anakin made it to her apartment. They had had so little time together thus far- she wanted to make this evening special. 

Anakin had started complaining about Ahsoka the second they were alone in her apartment.

“Can you believe it?” he asks, with barely a greeting. “The Council sent me a padawan, without even asking. After all the Council complains about me, they’re giving me some youngling to look after?”

“Maybe this is the responsibility you’ve been waiting for,” Padmé counsels. “To prove to them that you’re not a padawan anymore.”

“I have enough responsibility. I’m commanding an entire battalion and now I have to watch after some annoying kid,” Anakin scoffs.

She looks up, curious. “Is this usual? Assigning a padawan to a Jedi who didn’t request one?” 

“It is if Master Yoda thinks you need to be knocked down a peg.” says Anakin, with such earnest bitterness in his voice. She can’t help it- Padmé grins, then tries to hide her smile behind her hand. Anakin sees it.

“Oh, come on. Even my own wife revels in my misery.” Anakin says, trying for harshness but failing to hide his own smile.

“I think,” Padmé says, taking a sip of the Nubian wine. “That Ahsoka is lucky to be learning from such a skilled Jedi Knight.”

“Yeah?” says Anakin.

“I also think that she’s already growing on you.”

Anakin looks slightly sheepish. “Well. Maybe a little. She did help on the mission. Once she actually decided to start following orders.”

Padmé resisted the urge to ask him if Obi-Wan had fainted when he heard Anakin recommending following orders. She looked at the windows, the sunset on the Coruscant skyline. It made the city beautiful; lit up the whole Senate District with color.

She turned to her husband. “How was the mission?”

Instantly, Anakin stiffened. “It was fine.”

A few beats of silence. They had been married for less than a year. The days they'd actually spent _together_ during that time numbered in weeks, not months, Padmé knew that too well.

“I mean… how was it being back on Tatooine?” she asks gently. She could already see him withdrawing, and she tried to keep her disappointment off her face.

“I said it was _fine_. We finished the mission and that’s all that matters.” Anakin says, a little sharply.

Padme leaned closer to him, put her hand on top of his.

“You know that you can tell me anything, and I’ll listen. I won’t ever judge you or think any less of you, Ani.” She tries, her voice gentle.

Anakin looks away, his face falling. “I know. I know, okay. But- for tonight, can we- can we just be happy? Enjoy ourselves?”

Padmé bites her lip. She knows that going back to Tatooine must have hurt him. But she can’t force him to talk if he doesn’t want to. And they see each other so little. 

“Okay,” she says.

They talk for the rest of the night, and things gradually get less strained. They eat and drink and laugh together, and Padmé wishes she could spend every night like this. They spend nearly every night together for the next week, until Anakin is sent to the front again. 

But Anakin never speaks about what it was like to be on Tatooine again.

At least, not to her.

* * *

Ahsoka becomes a frequent topic of discussion over the next months. In secret holocalls and holomessages, Anakin tells Padmé about how she’s progressing in her saber forms, how she’s become more responsible and mature. Padmé thinks she loves him even more than she loved him before, for how much he loves Ahsoka, how obviously he cares for her. That was her Anakin- he loved deeply, and without regrets.

The next time she sees Ahsoka in person, she has been assigned as Padmé’s bodyguard for a conference on Alderaan.

She makes small talk with her on the trip. Ahsoka seemed genuinely curious about Padme’s work. She was also, Padme couldn’t help but think, so very young. She looked so much younger than Padmé remembers being at age 14. At age 14, Padmé was already Queen. At age 14, she had fought to defend her people against the Trade Federation. Padmé remembered being 14 vividly, remembered when it was just her and her handmaidens against the galaxy. Ahsoka is 14, a commander, a leader of men in battle, and Padmé thought: who let this child wield a blade and risk her life? All of the stories of Ahsoka’s tenacity and bravery that Anakin had told her seemed to be put in an uncomfortable new light.

It was more than a tad hypocritical, which was why she chose to say nothing. Besides- this wasn’t just a sacred cultural duty, as her girlhood queenship had been. This was Ahsoka’s religion, her duty and the life she chose. Who was Padmé to tell her otherwise?

Ahsoka saves her life from the assassin twice over before the event is over.

On her next holocall with Anakin, Padmé asks if he ever thinks Ahsoka is too young for the duties she is asked to perform, if he ever worries for her.

Anakin shakes his head, a sad smile on his face. “Padmé, I worry about her all the time.”

* * *

After Ahsoka’s trial, she grows quiet. The bright, confident child has been replaced by someone quieter, and in the weeks after Padmé knows to let it be. Ahsoka will talk when she needs to, and the occasional glimmers of the cheerful, self-assured girl she has come to know will have to be enough. 

Padmé is both disappointed and disillusioned by Ahsoka’s trial. The girl was railroaded, and she had barely managed to stall the trial long enough for Anakin to find the real culprit and save her. What was the Republic coming to, to have as shameful a trial as that, to nearly convict a child on such flimsy evidence? Of a crime that could have seen Ahsoka executed? The only glimmer of relief in the whole affair is that the Jedi Council took back Ahsoka’s expulsion, and Ahsoka accepted. They even Knighted her.

In between committee meetings and speeches, Padmé invites Ahsoka to lunch in her apartment. They eat take-out from her favorite Coruscanti restaurant in the Senate District, which she is told is much better than Temple fare. Padmé invites her mostly so she knows that she has a friendly ear, if she needs it. 

Ahsoka is 16 now- she asks questions about the legislation Padme introduces and her efforts to push for peace negotiations and a guaranteed pension and back-pay for the clones. Ahsoka is quieter, but more thoughtful as well, more mature. When Padmé looks at her, she can see the woman she will one day grow into. 

“You’ve grown up,” says Padmé with a sad smile.

“Had to at some point,” says Ahsoka, with a shrug that was just a little too casual to be genuine.

* * *

Ahsoka is on leave, on Coruscant, this time without Anakin. Anakin, who has been at the Outer Rim Sieges for months. Anakin, who is crucial to the war effort, who barely has time for a ten minute, once a week holo-call. Ahsoka is on Coruscant when Padmé finds out she’s pregnant. She can’t tell Anakin- this was the kind of thing that could distract him on the field, get his men killed, get him killed. And this wasn’t the kind of thing she wanted to tell him on a hurried holocall while he got Rex to guard the door.

So she tells no one, barely has time to let herself think about it. Still. In between her work in the Senate, Padmé wonders what kind of father Anakin will be. When they talked about it, Anakin had always said he wanted a family- multiple kids, Anakin had always wanted a sibling. Padmé had wanted that too. 

They hadn’t talked about what they would do if their child was Force-sensitive. She had always admired the Jedi, even before she knew one so closely, and she knew that there were many good reasons why parents across the galaxy chose to give their children to the Order. But she couldn’t imagine doing it herself. What would Anakin want? Sure, Anakin had his problems with the Order, but he loved being a Jedi. 

They hadn’t ever talked about how they would ever make their relationship public, if Anakin would resign from the Order or try to keep his position. She could imagine the scandal: news of an “affair” between a Jedi Knight and Senator on every holonews station. But it would be worse than that: an inappropriate, borderline illegal relationship between the de facto leader of the peace movement in the Senate and one of the two most famous Jedi Generals of the Grand Army of the Republic. Could her career survive that?

Not that her career felt all that important these days. Padmé had gotten into politics to enact change. To help people. But Jedi die by the dozens. Clones die by the thousands. Padmé’s attempts at peace negotiations die. Outside of her small faction, no one in the Senate cares, not unless it directly affects her world. Padme grows to hate her speeches, how she must pretend to be calm, how she must show she cares but not seem overly emotional. That would make her seem _unreasonable_. She wants to scream, because this war is unjust, and if they would just listen to her, if they would just consider reopening negotiations with the Separatists- 

The pregnancy is not the only thing she is not telling Anakin about during their infrequent holocalls. The meetings with Bail and Mon and their allies, the quiet discussions about what they will do when the war ends. What they will do if Palpatine does not give back the unprecedented, broad emergency powers he has found himself in possession of.

Padmé wanted this child, but the thought of what her life would become once she had this baby filled her with dread. She hated lying to her parents and to her sister. Her holocalls to her family had become less and less frequent since she had gotten married. Now Padmé stopped calling altogether, worried that if she called her mother, she would start talking and wouldn’t be able to stop.

She had hid her pregnancy from her handmaidens for as long as she could, and when she couldn’t anymore, she begged them for their secrecy, and to not ask her questions about the father. They had agreed after much coaxing. Hollé had cried, and the rest had given her such reproachful looks. She had never kept secrets from her handmaidens before. Once, they had been so close it was almost as if they hadn't been separate people at all.

Padmé had never felt so alone in her entire life.

At lunch with Ahsoka- they tried to get together at least twice a week every time they were both onplanet- she couldn’t help but ask.

“Ahsoka,” she asks. “Was Anakin a good Master?”

Ahsoka blinks. 

“Well- yeah, of course. At the beginning it was new, for both of us. And you know that Anakin can be... unorthodox, at times.” They both smiled at that. “But Anakin is also wise, and kind. He’s a great teacher. I wouldn’t have another Master.”

Of course he was. Why had she ever doubted? And he would be a good father too. Padmé is certain of it.

“You know he tells me how proud he is of you?” asks Padmé with a smile. “All the time. He loves to brag about his smart, talented padawan learner.”

“Oh… he does?” Ahsoka tries to hide her smile, her face turning a slightly brighter shade. “I- I don’t know what to say.”

Padmé laughs, light and relieved. “You don’t have to say anything. I think you do your Master credit, Ahsoka. You are turning into a very capable young woman.”

That just made Ahsoka blush worse.

They’re going to be fine, Padmé found herself thinking at that moment. Their little family will be fine.

* * *

Anakin was the only truly selfish thing Padmé had ever allowed herself, in a life dedicated to her people and the Republic.

She had fallen in love with Anakin because he was the first person she’d met since she’d become Queen who looked at her and saw _Padmé_ first and Amidala second. It wasn’t the only reason that she fell in love with him. She had been an overachiever since she was six years old. Of course, the love of Padmé’s life could not be so simple a thing.

Padmé had been elected Queen of a planet at age fourteen. Yet in many ways, she knew she was sheltered. It was one of the reasons the Naboo chose leaders so young- they were innocent, uncynical. Pure. Padmé had missed out on the life of a normal girl the day she had been chosen for the Legislative Youth program. And she had chosen to have this life, and she didn’t regret it. 

But sometimes, especially during the war, she had wondered if missing out on the majority of her childhood had left her without something crucial, something others had that she lacked. Sometimes, her desire to be optimistic, to see the best in people, felt crushing, _vapid_ in the face of the reality of working in politics. Every day, it seemed the Republic became more corrupt, more cynical, less of the democracy she’d grown up believing in. Every day, she wondered if what she did truly made a difference.

Loving Anakin was not an entirely different thing than loving the Republic. 

Padmé had fallen in love with him because he was brave and handsome. She had fallen in love because he was honest, and funny and kind to her. She had fallen in love because he was a true friend and a hero. A fundamentally kind little boy she had known who had grown into a good man. She had fallen in love because of how much he had loved her. 

He was dangerous- Padmé had always known that- but he would never hurt her. She had stayed in the Larses’ home that day on Tatooine, waiting anxiously for Anakin. The stories Owen and his father had told about the conflict between the Sand People and the farmers were familiar to her. Not too long ago relations between the Naboo and the Gungans could have been described like that. In that conversation before his mother's funeral- she didn’t fully understand. She didn’t want to. He had done a terrible, unforgivable thing that she could scarcely fathom.

But she had only wanted to soothe him. She had pitied him so fiercely, felt his grief and pain as if it were her own. On Tatooine, Padmé had watched this sad, broken boy who loved her more than anything confess his sins to her. And she had thought, _I can save him. I can fix him, with my love, with the love he is not allowed to have._

She had known Anakin as an adult for not even a full month when she agreed to marry him.

Padmé had married him because there was a war and she’d watched dozens of Jedi die on the sands of Geonosis on a mission to help rescue her. Because she’d had to prepare for assassination attempts since she was 12, and she’d seen too many girls who looked like her die to ever take even a day of her life for granted. Because they were young and they loved each other.

For Anakin, Padmé had betrayed her values. She had lied- to her people, to her friends and family, to the Republic. She had hidden a marriage. Worse, she had hidden a massacre, the murder of noncombatants and the murder of _children_ , even as she decried nearly identical Separatist war crimes on the floor of the Senate. She had tried to forget the truth she had learned in the desert. She had tried.

Later, Padmé will think: _What a fool I was_. 

(Later, on the days on which she was feeling less charitable to herself, she will think: _I did not love him in spite of his brokenness; I loved him because he was broken. Because he was dangerous, and because he was a monster. But he was a monster who loved me, and I was prideful enough to think I could save him_.) 


	2. Chapter 2

_19 BBY_

After she refuses to help Obi-Wan find her husband, after she watches him leave, after her attempts to comm Ahsoka fail again and again, Padmé is left to think. Her thoughts are not good and not kind. Threepio makes her take her pregnancy vitamins- she had forgotten, what with the fall of the Republic and all- and then suggests, polite as ever, that she lies down.

Padmé knows what she has to do. She has to choose between the word of Jedi Master Obi-Wan Kenobi and her husband. Then- well. Padmé’s dear husband, the man she knows is the only love of her life besides the Republic, did not necessarily come out on top.

_Gods help her._

Gods help her, Padmé thinks, because she thinks she might believe Obi-Wan. 

She has not believed in the Gods of Naboo since she was a very young child. She participated in the ceremonies as a child and even led them on occasions as a Queen, but Padmé has never truly believed in the old religion of her people. But now, she prays to the Gods, and she prays to the Force, because she might believe Obi-Wan, and she’s still going to go after her husband.

 _If it is true-_ then her husband has murdered children he knew. He has betrayed the Republic they both served. Her husband murdered the girl he trained, the girl he promised to protect, the girl he raised for three years alongside death and battle.

_If it is true-_

It is like this: if Padmé is going to burn what little is left of her life that still exists to the ground, she needs to be sure.

Padmé prays.

_Gods, help me, honored ancestors, Queens of the Naboo who ruled before me, Force- please, please, please-_

_Let it not be true._

* * *

Padmé can run and fight in any of her outfits, but knowing that she’s going into trouble beforehand, she decides to go with something practical. She chooses a dark blue dress made with a stiff blaster fire resistant fabric. Blue is the color of mourning among the Naboo. It is relatively comfortable, and she can put it on without her handmaidens’ help. There are folds in the fabric where she can hide a blaster or a vibroblade. The skirt is loose and short and covers up a pair of black leggings. She knows from experience that it is relatively easy to run in. It won’t hide her pregnancy, but that hardly matters now.

Padmé goes to her ship, taking only a bag of essentials and Threepio. She hopes that this will not be the last time she sees Coruscant, the apartment that she and Anakin made a home. After convincing Captain Typho to stay away- she will be safest doing this by herself- she heads to the cockpit.

Obi-Wan is sitting in the copilot’s chair when she gets in.

“Going somewhere?” he asks, his voice devoid of any humor.

Padmé steels herself, tries to make her voice distant and commanding, like Queen Amidala’s was. “I hardly see how that is any business of yours, Master Kenobi.”

He raised an eyebrow. She could almost hear him thinking: S _o it’s going to be like that, then._

“You know where he is,” Obi-Wan says.

“I don’t-”

“I know I can’t stop you from going,” he says. A lie, but a polite one. She is fully aware that if Obi-Wan Kenobi were a different sort of man, he was perfectly capable of _making_ her stay put.

“But you must understand, Padmé, that your life will be in terrible danger if you find him. He is not the man you know. The man you know is gone, and you must accept that.”

“I must- you ask me to give up on the love of my life, without proof, without even allowing a word from him in his defense?” Padmé doesn’t yell, but it’s a close thing.

“I found her body. I saw him strike her down on the security hologram.” His voice is hard and cold. “You may choose not to believe me, but it remains the truth. You will not be safe with him.”

“I will decide what I’m safe or not safe doing, Master Kenobi.”

“I can’t convince you otherwise,” he said. “I can accept that. However, I will be coming with you. You may choose to go to him, or do the smart thing and go into hiding, like I suggested earlier. I will be by your side, either way. Are those terms acceptable, Senator?”

Padmé frowns, and sits in the other seat. “I don’t appear to have a choice.”

Obi-Wan smiles humorlessly, his gray-blue eyes cold. Padmé feels a bolt of ice down her spine.

“Then we understand each other,” he says.

* * *

Padmé vomits twice on the journey to Mustafar. And she’s not sure if it’s because of the end of democracy in the Republic, her husband’s possible betrayal of every value she holds dear, or, possibly, just morning sickness. Threepio had fretted, and Obi-Wan had silently gotten her water. Other than that, it had been a tense trip, mostly spent in silence in the cockpit.

“He’s here,” says Obi-Wan the moment they hit atmosphere. 

It is the first time he's spoken in hours. Padmé doesn’t bother to ask how he knows.

“Hmm. Mustafar,” Obi-Wan says to himself as he looks out the viewport, eyes distant as she unbuckles. Then he looks at her, gaze uncomfortably intense.

She observes the planet through the viewport. It is red and boiling. It looks like something out of a nightmare, a place of torment from an old Nubian legend. That is only a coincidence, though, of course. Humans are the most populous species in the galaxy, but they are not the only ones, and other species live best in other climates. She’s sure that more than a few of her colleagues in the Senate would find Mustafar perfectly charming.

“Let’s go,” she says. Padmé isn't Force-sensitive, but she thinks that she can almost feel Anakin too.

But Obi-Wan doesn’t move from his seat. He suddenly seems almost regretful, a little unsure.

“You must understand. I have lost-” he takes a shuddering breath. “ _Many_ friends today. I do not want to add you to that number."

He shakes his head. “I cannot let you go to him. I saw- I saw him strike her down, without hesitation, as soon as she dared to defy him. Please, Padmé. Leave this place in your ship while I confront him. I’ll find my own way back.”

Padmé’s voice is desperate. “I cannot let you kill him without even letting me hear what he has to say.”

“I know I cannot convince you to think of your own life, but please, Padmé, think of the life of your child. Think of a galaxy that needs you now more than ever before.” Obi-Wan says. “And if I cannot convince you to leave, I will not leave you defenseless. But you must promise me- you must give me your word, Padmé, that if things go badly, as soon as I say the word, you will go to the ship.”

Something of the genuine concern in his voice gets through to her. It is a reasonable enough request.

“Very well,” Padmé nods. 

Something catches her eye through the viewport. _Ah_. Anakin has recognized her ship. She watches him run closer, her heart frozen. She glances at Obi-Wan once more before turning away. She leaves to face her husband.

* * *

The first thing Padmé notices is the wall of heat that hits her like a wave as she opens the door. The next is the scent of sulfur and ash in the air. The third is Anakin, still running. He stops in his tracks as soon as he sees Obi-Wan follow her out the door. 

“Padmé? What are you doing here with _him_?” Anakin’s voice is suspicious as he glances at his former Master and best friend.

Padmé glances to Obi-Wan quickly. His face is a mask, completely impassive, but he does not take his eyes off of Anakin. She takes a few cautious steps forward, moving off of the ramp. Obi-Wan remains by her side.

“I didn't have a choice. He insisted on coming,” she says, honestly. “He told me things- Ani, he said I wouldn’t be safe with you.”

Anakin’s eyes narrow. “He’s trying to turn you against me. You can’t trust a word he says! I had hoped otherwise, but it seems that Obi-Wan has sided with those who sought to assassinate the Chancellor.”

“You mean the Emperor?” Obi-Wan asks dryly, his voice low.

“You will not turn her against me with your lies, Obi-Wan.” Anakin warns, his body tense as he eyes the Jedi Master. “Padmé, you can’t believe a word he says.”

“You don’t even know what he’s said.” Padmé says aloud, feeling fear constrict her heart as Anakin fails test after test.

“I know enough- Padmé, I would never hurt you, or our baby. You don't need to be afraid.”

Padmé shakes her head. “So you know that he told me that you killed younglings. That- that Ahsoka is-”

She can’t bring herself to finish the sentence. _Dead at your hands_. It can’t be true. It sounded ridiculous, even in her head. It was a mathematical equation that didn't add up properly. Anakin Skywalker, her brave and true husband, would never hurt Ahsoka Tano.

But Anakin freezes when Padmé says her name. There is something ugly on his face.

He is very angry, she realizes distantly.

“What did he tell you?” Anakin asks.

Padmé’s heart freezes. It is made of glass. He- he hadn’t denied it. She’d told him that Obi-Wan had accused him of murdering _younglings_ and he hadn’t-

“He said that you killed her.” Padmé says, her voice almost inaudible.

Anakin is silent for a long moment.

“Padmé,” he begins, taking a step towards her. “Listen to me-”

Padmé feels suddenly light-headed. Her world seems to tilt.

“ _No_ ,” she says, her heart shattering. “No- you didn’t-”

“I had no choice. Ahsoka gave me no choice. She raised her sabers against me at the Temple!”

Padmé’s heart is racing. She feels ill.

“At the Temple- while you were killing younglings?”

Anakin is silent for a long moment. “I had to end the war, as the Chancellor ordered. There can be no peace while the Jedi still exist. And I have done it, Padmé. The war is over. Our child will grow up in a peaceful galaxy.”

She thinks, distantly, if she hears Anakin mention their child one more time, that she will be sick.

“Our child? What about Ahsoka, the girl you raised for _three years_ -” Padmé catches her breath, voice breaking.

“Ahsoka gave me no choice. Don’t you understand, Padmé? It was for you! To save you and our child, to stop my nightmares from coming true like they did with my mother, I needed to do this.” Anakin says, his voice one of a delusional zealot. “I had no other choice.”

Padmé’s heart stops. 

“For me?” she says. “You- you killed her for-”

She can’t speak anymore. She can’t say it, because if she says it, then it’s real, it’s true. Padmé can’t look at him anymore. Anakin is saying something, but she can’t hear anything anymore. She falls to her knees, feeling the warmth of the stone against her knees, against her hands. She doesn’t scream. She doesn’t cry out. She just closes her eyes and breathes.

She can’t speak. For all that her words have served her, given her a successful career, a reputation across the galaxy, she is struck silent by this. _Our child, our love, our friends, our family,_ Padmé’s heart cries. But more than that: _The Republic. Democracy!_ All that Padmé has lived and breathed since she was twelve years old in the Legislative Youth program and an old politician named Palpatine had asked her if she’d ever thought about running for Queen. More than that: a girl named Ahsoka, who Padmé had hoped her child would be like. 

Her head swims. She thinks of Cordé’s last words, of all her handmaidens who died for Naboo, for the Republic, for _her_. But Ahsoka hadn’t chosen this, hadn’t known the risks. She hadn’t chosen to be cut down by a man she trusted.Padmé could see in her mind’s eye: Ahsoka, a brave girl, a compassionate girl, and Anakin’s lightsaber running through her heart-

It was true. It had always been true. She had known it from the moment the words left Obi-Wan’s mouth. She was just too much of a coward to accept it.

“Senator,” Obi-Wan only glances her way for a moment, his focus completely on Anakin. “Go to the ship. You do not want to be here for this.”

Anakin barely seems to notice that she was there anymore, slowly circling Obi-Wan, like a predatory beast. Obi-Wan’s gaze is darker than she has ever seen, not even on Liberation Day on Naboo all those years ago, the look on his face when he came carrying his Master’s body up from the Theed generators.

And even as Obi-Wan looks at his former apprentice, Padmé knows that he does not see him. Anakin was dead in his mind- he’d died with the Jedi, with the old Masters and younglings in the Temple, with the Knights turned Generals in the fields. He’d died with Ahsoka. The man standing in front of him was only an affront to Anakin’s memory.

“I’ll come for you after this is over, Padmé.” Anakin says, eyes on his former Jedi Master.

“No,” she says, softly, too softly for either of them to hear. Padmé is not Force sensitive- _not even close_ , Anakin had teasingly told her once. But even she can feel the tension in the air, separate from the heat and the noxious fumes of Mustafar.

 _What can she do? What can she do?_ Padmé stumbles back towards the ship, barely aware of her surroundings. She falls again to her knees before she reaches the landing platform. She shudders, tears falling, silently. 

_What can she do?_ When Padmé can get to her feet again, she hears yelling.

“Your lies have made her suffer needlessly. You will pay for that, Obi-Wan.” Anakin says.

Obi-Wan holds his lightsaber in a loose grip. “Why did you strike down Ahsoka?”

“I had no choice!” Anakin yells, his whole body tense.

“She was our padawan, Anakin!” Obi-Wan screams.

Padmé has heard enough. She runs back into the fray.

“Anakin!” she yells, desperate to get his attention. “Anakin, please. Come away with me. Help me raise our child. Leave everything else behind.”

“Padmé-” begins Anakin. 

“Obi-Wan,” Padmé turns her attention to the Jedi Master, pleading. “Please, let us go in peace and you’ll never see either of us again. I’ll make sure of it. Anakin, I won’t go with you back to Coruscant, but we can be together. We can raise our child together. Please, please, just listen to me.”

Obi-Wan is still holding his blue lightsaber low, in a defensive position.

Anakin gives Obi-Wan a glance, then turns to her. “I am listening. But this isn’t necessary.”

Padmé turns again to Obi-Wan. “I know- I know what has happened, Obi-Wan. But please, let us go, out of whatever friendship we used to have. _Please_.” Her voice breaks, and she is nearly shaking with emotion. 

Obi-Wan shakes his head, disappointed. Padmé runs to Anakin’s side, ignoring the fire in his eyes. Padmé lets him hug her, relaxes into his grip. 

“Everything will be alright, Padmé. We don’t need to run away. And you have nothing to fear. All you need to do is just to trust me. Everything I have done is for you and the baby. You will be safe.” Anakin says softly, but he is still gazing at Obi-Wan warily from over her shoulder. His mechanical hand cards through her hair and his flesh hand holds her tight.

It is said that a Jedi can tell when a person is lying.

Padmé had asked Anakin about that once. He had laughed and answered. “ _Well, kind of. If I pay attention, I can sense a person’s emotions, and from emotions you can usually work out intentions._ ”

So when Padmé tells him: _Run away with me, please, I love you, I love you, I forgive you, I love you-_

A part of her means it. A part of her wants it. And she forces all of herself to want it, to throw everything she has left into wanting it. And Anakin believes her.

 _He doesn’t see me_ , Padmé realizes. She’s standing right in front of him, and she is begging him to stop. And he doesn’t even register her words. Not really.

“I love you,” Anakin says.

“I love you too,” she whispers into his robe. 

Then, quickly and neatly, Padmé takes the vibroblade hidden in the folds of her dress and slides it deep between his ribs.

“But you will _never_ touch another one of my children again.”

Anakin stumbles back. He looks surprised, mostly, and he mechanically takes the blade out from between his ribs.

“You- you... _”_ He looks down at his wound and suddenly his face contorts in rage and pain, his eyes shining yellow, his hand raised. 

“You _liar-_ ”

She feels pressure on her throat, and- and she can’t breathe. She tries to cry out, fear and adrenaline overpowering everything else. But no sound comes out. Her hands grasp desperately at her throat, trying to pull off phantom hands. Despite it all, she thinks as the pain and sudden terror brings tears to her eyes, she hadn’t realized that he would do this. 

“Anakin! Let her go, now!” Obi-Wan yells.

It is either Obi-Wan’s words or the fact that Anakin doubles over in pain the next moment that makes him let her breathe again. He falls to his knees, crying out in shock and pain. It’s hard to see on his dark tunic, but his blood spills out on the rocks of Mustafar.

Obi-Wan takes a sharp breath as Anakin falls. Padmé runs to the Jedi Master's side, still breathing heavily. They stare at Anakin’s crumpled form, not yet dead, still _moving_ -

“We need to go,” Padmé says, barely recognizing her own voice.

“He’s dying. He’s-” Obi-Wan begins to stumble towards his old padawan. 

Padmé knows. Her husband’s still-warm blood is on her shaking hands and on her dress. She takes Obi-Wan’s arm, carefully.

“ _Yes_ , and we need to go,” she says, and there is no trace of Padmé in her voice now. She is the Queen turned Senator known as Amidala, because if she was still Padmé, _weak-soft-foolish_ Padmé, she would be kneeling, sobbing at her husband’s side, even if it killed her and the baby. Even if _he_ killed her.

“Obi-Wan,” she says, and her voice is steady. “I need to go to a med center. The baby is coming.”

He stares at her for a moment in shock. But just as suddenly, Obi-Wan seems to break out of the trance. “Of course. We have to go.”

Still. She has to take his arm as she walks back to the ship. Artoo is there, loyal little Artoo- when did Artoo get there? She does not look at Anakin’s now-still form. She doesn’t.

It was already too late. It is too late for all of them. It has been for a long time.

She thinks- that moment, in the desert, when Anakin had told her the truth. She should have listened to him, really listened. She should have reported him, for his own sake if not for justice. He never would have forgiven her, but maybe- maybe someone could have helped him, stopped him. Before he- 

But she hadn’t. She had tried to forget, and she’d damned them all. 

Obi-Wan helps her to the ship. They leave what is left of Anakin on Mustafar to burn.

* * *

Padmé looks at the men gathered around her bed in the med center on Polis Massa. She had insisted they not wait until she was more recovered. She wondered if this was it: her and Bail, perhaps the last of the Delegation of 2000. Obi-Wan and Yoda, perhaps the last of the Jedi. Her children rest, fed and sleeping. Obi-Wan holds Luke; Bail holds Leia.

Twins. Anakin hadn’t seen that. 

Before, she had expected to feel such love for her child- children, now- but mostly she feels exhausted, feels the pains of birth, of almost having her trachea crushed. There are bruises on her neck. But there is no more time for grief. Her husband is dead and gone; so is the Republic. Now, there is only survival.

They speak in soft voices, as to not distress the children. They are so young, so small, so vulnerable. Bail shares news of the Senate- Palpatine is amassing more and more power, the systems are starting to fall in line. There is some protest, but it will not be enough. The Separatist Parliament has surrendered. There are still some holdouts, but Clone Wars are over.

Luke begins to fuss. Obi-Wan, who has barely left her side since she went into labor, dutifully rocks him, shushing the child gently. Luke blinks, his eyes widen, and begins to cry in earnest.

“Here,” Padmé sits up a little more in her bed. “Let me try.”

“Of course,” Obi-Wan hands her the baby.

She holds her child close, rocking him, and slowly he settles. How very small he is. Padmé almost can’t believe it. The med center droids had said that was normal- twins, premature birth.

“Safe, the children will not be,” Yoda says. “Safe, they will not be, as long as the Sith rules the galaxy. Find them, the Emperor will seek to. Safer, it would be, if split up, they were. Easier to hide them from the Sith.”

“It’s true,” says Obi-Wan. “Their presence in the Force is already strong, and will only get stronger. Together, they will be a beacon of Light in a galaxy that has become very dark.”

Padmé tightens her grip on Luke instinctively. “I’m not giving up my children. And I won’t let them be separated. They’re brother and sister, they deserve to know each other.”

All eyes turn to Yoda.

“Your choice, it always has been. Your children, they are.” says the old Master. “Into exile, I will go. My time to decide, passed, it has.”

Padmé sighs, letting the tension go as much as she can. “Masters Jedi- I don’t know the Force like you do. It might be safer if they were separated, but I can’t allow that. Is there anything else we can do to hide them from Palpatine?”

“I can work to disguise their Force presences. If we go somewhere remote- some planet in the far reaches of the Outer Rim- it’s not guaranteed, but there’s a chance I can shield their presences in the Force enough that they will not be found.” Obi-Wan says.

Yoda nods. “Work, that may. Help you begin, I will, Obi-Wan.”

Padmé nods. It’s not a question- Obi-Wan would do that, hide away from a galaxy that needed him. For Anakin’s children, he would do that.

“Thank you,” she says, softly. It’s not enough- not nearly enough- but it will have to be.

* * *

She is deemed recovered enough by the med droids to leave within the week. She hugs Bail, tells him to keep fighting, to not take unnecessary risks, to give her love to Mon and Breha. Bail kisses Luke and Leia on their little heads and tells her to be safe as well. She bids farewell to Yoda, who has one last private conversation with Obi-Wan before he leaves for his exile. Padmé takes her children, she takes her droids, she takes Obi-Wan, and she runs.

She becomes Padmé Hardeen, a young widow with two children living with her older brother, Ben. They find a farm on an Outer Rim planet so remote that it takes a week to map out a route there on their old ship that Obi-Wan won in a sabacc game. The farm they buy is small, and the nearest village is a day’s walk away. The planet is remote, but peaceful. The Clone Wars haven’t touched this planet, and they hope neither will the Empire.

Someday, she hopes to return. To begin fixing everything that went wrong in the Republic, to restore what was lost. It didn’t matter if Palpatine could’ve done it some other way, if he had manipulated her. It didn’t matter if she’d vocally opposed the majority of his worst excesses, in those past few years. She had called for the vote of no confidence, she had guided his path to the Chancellorship and history will damn her for it.

Someday, Padmé hopes that history will forgive her, not just for supporting Palpatine, but for Anakin. For being her husband’s first enabler, the first person to see his crimes and care more about his feelings than his victims.

Someday, she hopes that she will be able to forgive herself.

On occasions, Padmé wakes up crying, Anakin’s blood still sticky on her hands, begging for him to forgive her. But, more often, her dreams involve the Jedi Temple. The Temple is on fire, smoke fills the air, and she steps carefully around the bodies of younglings. Each time, she finds Anakin and it is already too late. Ahsoka is crumpled on the floor, or hanging lifelessly on Anakin’s blade.

Obi-Wan is usually already awake when she gives up on sleep and heads down to the kitchen. Sometimes he is sitting at the table, and sometimes they talk in soft voices about their shared griefs. Sometimes, they make breakfast for themselves and the children in silent companionship. Sometimes, he is meditating outside, and leaves a still-warm cup of caf on the table for her.

It is not the life Padmé had imagined for herself, but it is a life.

There are worse moments to come for their little family. Someday, Padmé will find out that her husband lived. Someday, her children will face their father.

At the med center on Polis Massa- Padmé doesn’t name her daughter after Ahsoka. She had considered it. But Ahsoka was a young woman with a galaxy of potential inside her, and Ahsoka was murdered by a man she loved, the person she trusted most in the galaxy. Nothing can fix that. She can’t be replaced, and Padmé would never disrespect her memory by trying to.

The Jedi say that when people die, they are not really gone. They rejoin the Force, and then they are everywhere- in a blade of grass, in a warm summer breeze, in all the distant stars of the night sky. Sometimes, she even hears Obi-Wan speaking with his old Master on the walks he takes alone around their farm. She knows his faith brings him comfort. 

Padmé doesn’t know if she believes that the people she lost are still out there, but sometimes- sometimes she doesn’t feel so alone, even when she should. And she wonders. On warm days, she likes to sit outside their little house on the nameless planet on the edge of the galaxy. Sometimes she is with Obi-Wan. Other days, on the days he can’t bear to listen, she is by herself. Padmé sits with Luke and Leia, and she tells them about Ahsoka Tano and how very brave she was.


End file.
